


Collision

by more_than_melody



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: F/M, Ishval Civil War, Royai - Freeform, Young Royai, flame alchemist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-05
Updated: 2021-01-05
Packaged: 2021-03-16 04:42:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28576194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/more_than_melody/pseuds/more_than_melody
Summary: Roy finds Riza in Ishval.She's seated, watching him, her sharp eyes caught in the light of the dying sun. That rifle is propped next to her and the uniform she wears does not look new - it's as worn out and tired as the expression her young face. He tries to calculate how long it has been since he saw her last but his mind sputters – time has so little meaning these days it might as well have been a lifetime.This was not the ambush he was afraid of but he feels like he is dying anyway.
Relationships: Riza Hawkeye & Roy Mustang, Riza Hawkeye/Roy Mustang
Comments: 3
Kudos: 39





	Collision

_Everything we've done_ _  
__It's there on our faces for anyone willing to_ _  
__Read between the lines_

_Now look at where we are_

Like Gold – Vance Joy

* * *

When he returns to camp it is almost nighttime. Smoke chokes the horizon but here the air is clear enough that it ought to be easier to breathe. It's not, but at least it doesn't burn in his lungs in the same way. The sun is setting, heavy and red and the temperature is dropping.

It's not at though the nights in the desert are hot. The burning is inside of him, his entirely.

It has been like this for weeks, for months now. Skin dry and cracked from the heat of the day ( _or from the fire that threatens consumption_ ) and sand like ash in his mouth. He's thinking of a cold shower – the only moment of the day where he feels any peace it seems.

He's barely paying attention to where he's going until she says his name.

“Major Mustang.”

Her voice is the same, somehow. She nearly – _nearly_ \- fumbles over it, his rank unfamiliar when paired with his last name. He turns, half a prayer on his lips, begging to be wrong.

Of course he's not.

She's seated, watching him, her sharp eyes caught in the light of the dying sun. That rifle is propped next to her and the uniform she wears does not look new - it's as worn out and tired as the expression her young face. He tries to calculate how long it has been since he saw her last but his mind sputters – time has so little meaning these days it might as well have been a lifetime.

This was not the ambush he was afraid of but he feels like he is dying anyway.

_And he thinks, of course, of the last time he saw her -_

“What are you doing here?” he asks, his own voice unrecognizable in its grief.

She smiles at that and that single, bitter expression transforms her into someone he does not know. In the fading light of day the shadows on her face are dark slashes, her mouth a line as harsh as the unforgiving desert landscape.

"My reasons are my own,” is all she says.

_And yet – it had been him, his words as they stood side by side at her fathers grave – stupid ones, now, he's realized – that had promised her all the things she could do to help make the world a better place – hadn't he told her that was why he had enlisted?_

It had gotten him what he wanted at the time but goddamn if he isn't paying for it now.

“You shouldn't -” _You shouldn't have listened to me._

Something in her eyes dares him to say it, but like the coward he is he falls silent.

He almost walks away then, but that feels too much like running – something he's done plenty of times before. He deserves to suffer this – it is his sin after all. He shoves his hands into his pockets so she can't see them shake.

There are so many other questions he has wanted to ask her but here, in the middle of a war zone, the ground beneath them watered with blood – they all desert him. So he just stands there, silent, until -

“I'm sorry,” he says.

“For what?” she asks. _As though this has nothing to do with him._

“This is my fault,” he says. Doesn't he know it – he has spent plenty of nights restless in his bed with the weight of his betrayal. She trusted him with her father's research - _or he persuaded her to give it to him_ \- and he has used it exactly as she feared.

They both know it, but the way she is looking at him is _as though this -_

“It has nothing to do with you,” she says. “Major.”

This time he meets her eyes. We have no history here, she says, without speaking.

He nods - is it an agreement? He hardly knows. He takes a deep, struggling breath as though unwriting years of their lives. ~~_Her asleep on the sofa, books fallen on the floor, sharing a meal together beneath the flickering porch light in the heavy, humid months of summer, soaked to the skin in the rain while the storm rolls in -_~~

It's not as though this is the first time he has tried for forget it. Whatever life they had before this doesn't feel as though it belongs to him anymore.

~~_Riza_ ~~

“Sit down,” she says, and the trace of annoyance in her voice is achingly familiar. “My neck hurts enough without having to look up at you.”

He sits beside her, keeping a careful distance between them so that she does not catch fire too. He has already done enough damage. The silence stretches but she doesn't leave – the sun plummets and soon they are left in the half dark, electric lights humming to life nearby.

~~_-and the last time he saw her, lying on her stomach in the chilly living room of that old, creaking house, the red lines on her back swimming before his eyes in the dying light of the day -_ ~~

“How long have you been out here?” he asks.

A safe enough question, and he has to ask something since he can't ask _how long has it been since you died -_

“Six months,” she says. “By my best guess.”

He knows that feeling. He tries again to count the years since he last saw her, ~~_since the aftermath of her fathers funeral and the long, dusty afternoons spent deciphering the notes on her body_~~. By his best count it has been three years since he passed the state alchemy exam. “Did they send you fresh out of the academy?” he asks, and there is a cold in the pit of his stomach that is new and frightening.

She shakes her head. “Halfway through the last year. Not the whole class but they thought some of us could handle it. When this is over -” She bites off the sentence, her hand on her knee clenching into a fist.

It is even worse than he imagined.

“Will you go back?” he asks.

She shrugs. “Do I have much of a choice?” she asks. Her voice is stiffer than it used to be ~~_and in that second he would give anything to hear her laugh again, the way she had when they were younger_~~.

A chill gust of wind cuts through the camp, kicking up dust and bringing with it the sharp smell of ozone and smoke. The days are long and hot but the nights are cold and somehow longer. Beside him, she shivers.

“I'll never get used to it,” she says.

She could mean so many things, and as he looks over at her, silhouetted against the flickering of the electric lights. It's like the moon is crashing to earth – she was never meant to be here. A clash of celestial bodies meant to be held at arms length. All his good intentions have brought nothing but ruin for both of them.

“How long?” she asks, echoing his own question.

“Eighteen months,” he says. “More or less.”

“Mmm.”

They watch the others moving through the camp, nearly indistinguishable in their uniforms. For a second he thinks he sees Hughes but it's just a trick of the eye in the absence of light. She is talking, telling him about the other members of her unit. He listens, mostly, reveling in the steady cadence of her voice but -

Not far off they are building a ~~pyre~~ fire. Apprehension flares, like a spark in his chest. It's not uncommon – nights are cold here. She falls silent, turning her head slightly to follow his line of sight. Her shoulders stiffen.

A pile of wood – mostly debris from the wreckage of buildings.

“Major, do you want to light it for us?” someone calls. There is a chorus of laughter and he tenses.

Beside him, she clears her throat. “Let's walk,” she says, getting to her feet. A small mercy on her part, or perhaps she doesn't want to hear it either.

  
  


They wander away from the camp a little ways, or rather, he follows her as she wanders. Leaving the fire behind, as much as he can. When the voices are distant enough she stops. This used to be a street, now strewn with the rubble of blown out buildings, dark shapes rising from the ground on both sides. There is no question of _are we safe here_ because the answer, these days, is always no.

“Look,” she says, tilting her face upward.

Overhead the stars are bright, the sky uncommonly clear. The moon is just a sliver. If it weren't for her he never would have noticed. In that moment, the night sky heavy and velvet above them, he can breathe clearly again.

~~_Lying in the overgrown grass behind the house, the same sky brilliant above them, searching for constellations_ ~~

When he looks over at her again his mouth is dry in a way that has nothing to do with the desert.

“What do you miss the most?” she asks.

There is precious little of his life before this to miss, and now that she's standing here beside him, well -

“Snow,” he says instead, thinking of the numbing cold, a shock to the system, melting in the palms of his hands.

“I miss the rain,” she says softly, closing her eyes. She leaves the rest unspoken but the expression on her face says it anyway – will they live long enough to see it again?

He reaches out and places his hand on her shoulder. She jumps at the contact and for a moment he wonders ~~_was I the last person she let close enough to touch her?_~~

_~~Riza~~ _

He can't bring himself to use just her last name, so he doesn't use any at all. “I swear that there is something after this,” he says. It's a promise he means to keep, ~~ _after breaking_~~ _ ~~so many others.~~_ They both need this – not a way out but a way forward – there is no getting _out_ of this.

He waits for the sharpness of her reply – _how can you expect me to believe you this time?_ \- but it doesn't come.

“I'll hold you to that,” she says instead.

This painful collision of planets will leave him in orbit. There will be no leaving her behind this time.

  
  
  



End file.
